This 'commedia per musica' was the first German comic opera (opera buffa). Pallavicino's libretto was based on Bernardo Dovizi da Bibbiena's comedy La Calandra (around 1507), which drew on Plautus (as acknowledged in the preface to the original print of the play). The twins in Dovizi's comedy are a brother and a sister, Lidio and Santilla. Another production of this opera in Ristori's lifetime took place at Moscow in 1731 (see Production ID 10710). Pallavicino's libretto was later set again by Johann Georg Schürer in 1748 (Sartori ID 4521). Other operatic adaptations of Dovizi's comedy: Giuseppe Gazzaniga (Sartori ID 4522) and Antonio Sacchini.